Ranunculus bulbosus: Golden Spring Greetings by Bulbous Buttercups

Summary: Ranunculus bulbosus is a wildflower of western Europe, introduced in North America and elsewhere. Bulbous buttercup greets spring with golden flowers.

Bulbous Buttercup (Ranunculus bulbosus), Great Ashby District Park, Stevenage, Hertfordshire, South East England: AnemoneProjectors, CC BY SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Ranunculus bulbosus is an Old World perennial native to western Europe and naturalized outside of its homelands, including successful introductions in eastern and western North America.

In eastern Canada, Ranunculus bulbosus enjoys successful introductions into Ontario, Quebec, and two Maritime provinces of Newfoundland and New Brunswick. Cross-country, a disjunct, or separate, population on the west coast is found in British Columbia.

In the United States, Ranunculus bulbosus claims homelands primarily in a swath from the center to the east as well as on the west coast.

In addition to California, the introduced wildflower is found in the Pacific Northwestern states of Oregon and Washington.

In the central United States, Ranunculus bulbosus is found in the Great Plains state of Kansas and in the Midwestern states of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri and Ohio.

The golden wildflower thrives in the Gulf Coast states of Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi, as well as in the south central states of Kentucky and Tennessee.

The spring bloomer ranges in the nation's capital, Washington, D.C., in New England's maple syrup state of Vermont, as well as in all states along the eastern seaboard, with the exception of Florida, from Maine to Georgia.

In addition to bulbous buttercup, other common names for Ranunculus bulbosus include bulbous crowfoot and St. Anthony's turnip.

A member of the buttercup, or crowfoot family, of Ranunculaceae, bulbous buttercups present distinctive features. The plant's bulbous underground stem is known botanically as a bulbo-tuber or a corm (Ancient Greek: κορμοσ, kormos, “trunk stripped of its boughs”). Above ground, bulbous buttercups are identified by reflexed, or backward curving, sepals.

Stems arising from the base usually as multiples but also in singles may attain a height of almost 2 feet (60 centimeters).

Leaves exhibit trilobate, or three-lobed, shapes.

Five petals of shiny gold open in April and last into June or July. Five smaller, green-to-yellow sepals curve backward at the floral base.

As with all buttercups, fresh foliage contains ranunculin, an unstable compound. Via wounding activities such as grazing, ranunculin breaks down into glucose and protoanemonin, a toxin that causes extreme mucosal blisters, contact dermatitis and internal distress.

Livestock, especially cows and horses, avoid buttercups in pastures but may suffer extreme, even fatal symptoms, such as paralysis, from desperate or unknowing consumption.

Humans may exhibit painful blisters or experience diarrhea or vomiting from buttercup's renowned acrid juices.

In Native American ethnobotany, the Iroquois treated toothaches with Ranunculus bulbosus roots. Homeopathy utilizes bulbous buttercups in accordance with like-cures-like principles.

Culinary appreciation includes boiling or pickling roots and pickling the buttery flowers.

Bulbous buttercups thrive in the meadow along my yard's southern border, especially clustering a few feet from the capacious Chinese chestnut (Castanea mollissima) that shades the southeastern lawn.

In April 2015, bulbous buttercups are growing quickly and opening their butter-yellow petals in affirmation of spring's golden panoramas.

Bulbous buttercups seem to exude an inner glow that radiates outward from its glorious golden petals as captured rays of sunlight and serves as sunny reminders of spring's vibrancy.

trilobate, or three-lobed, shape of bulbous buttercup's leaves; May 9, 2013: Florent Beck (european flo), CC BY SA 2.0, via Flickr

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

Bulbous Buttercup (Ranunculus bulbosus), Great Ashby District Park, Stevenage, Hertfordshire, South East England: AnemoneProjectors, CC BY SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bulbous_Buttercup_(Ranunculus_bulbosus).jpg?uselang=fr

trilobate, or three-lobed, shape of bulbous buttercup's leaves; May 9, 2013: Florent Beck (european flo), CC BY SA 2.0, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/european-flo/16596393888/

For further information:

Moerman, Daniel E. Native American Medicinal Plants: An Ethnobotanical Dictionary. Portland OR: Timber Press, 2009.